bordésvsboursesWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: bordés is a adjective, bourses is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“bordés” is an adjective and “bourses” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#48,950
“bordés” frequency rank
#7,936
“bourses” frequency rank
56886
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature bordés bourses
Definition Masculin pluriel de bordé. Pluriel de bourse.

Where the eye mixes bordés and bourses

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
bordés
7 ch
bourses

Why the eye confuses bordés with bourses

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: bordés is \bɔʁ.de\ while bourses is \buʁs\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56886, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bordés is recorded at frequency rank #48,950, classified as anadj, pronounced \bɔʁ.de\. bourses is at rank #7,936, tagged as anoun, pronounced \buʁs\.

Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.

With a confusion score of 56886, this pair ranks #118,339 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of bordés vs bourses

Shared letters: bors. Private to "bordés": . Private to "bourses": eu.

"bordés" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "bourses" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • boursesbbourses · boruses · bouress · bourrses · boursess · boursses · bousres · buorses

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "bordés" for "bourses" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "bordés" is an adjective and "bourses" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "bordés" vs "bourses" - which ranks higher?
"bourses" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,936 in our French list, against #48,950 for "bordés". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "bordés" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "bourses" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #118,339 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "bordés" and "bourses" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bordés vs bourdes". Nearby pair
  • Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes

Confusion rank #118,339 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list